Down the Drain

I could never tell my son Grayson no. So when he asked if he could go jump in the puddles out in the storm, I said yes.

The rain pounded the roof. It was a real downpour.

I looked out the window to check on him. He was dancing and laughing in what had become a small river in the street. The current swept him off his feet and dragged him to the storm drain. He clawed helplessly at the cement as he was sucked down.

Watching my son die was the hardest thing I ever did. The second was telling my wife.

After that, I was drinking a lot. Hungover almost constantly. I felt like I deserved to feel horrible. I should have just told him no.

My wife didn’t talk very much after that. I would find her huddled over the kitchen sink, as if about to vomit from grief.

She would take hot showers for hours.

One day, a little nauseous, I stumbled to our master bathroom to hug the toilet. The door was closed, my wife was in there.

But I heard her talking. It was quiet, like she didn’t want anyone to hear, but she was having a whole conversation.

Was she on the phone? Was it an affair? I wouldn’t blame her.

I made out, “A good time down there,” and, “I’ve missed you so much.”

When she finally came out I asked her, “Who were you talking to?”

She got very defensive. “Myself. Just talking to myself.”

I didn’t believe her. Curiosity got the better of me. I procured a nanny cam and hid it in the bathroom. Maybe uncouth, but she was my wife, and I was worried.

Later the next day, what I saw frightened me. She turned on the shower and spent an hour with her head in the sink, whispering down the drain. Eventually she went in the shower, down on the ground, head near that drain too. Chatting away.

Did she think she was talking to our son? This delusion had taken hold of her. Did she need a doctor?

I spent all night thinking of what to say to her. When I woke in the morning she wasn’t in bed.

I followed my way to a mechanical whirring sound in the kitchen. The garbage disposal was left on.

That’s when I saw my pale wife, flat on the ground covered in blood. She didn’t make a sound as she pushed her hand down to the wrist in the garbage disposal.

She was trying to go down the drain.

I turned the disposal off. That’s when I heard it. The faintest echo. A distant whisper coming from the drain.

It was Grayson’s voice.

“Nothing hurts down here, Dad. Mom and I want you to be with us!”

Well. I’ve never told my son no. I saw myself reaching for the switch, to turn the disposal back on.